Friday, 31 March 2017

Theaker's Quarterly Fiction #59: now out!

Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction #59 is now out! This issue, one of our best ever, contains seven short stories, all of them likely to amaze: “The Devil’s Hollow” by Rafe McGregor, “Give You a Game?” by Michael Wyndham Thomas, “The Baby Downstairs” by Jessy Randall, “The Constant Providers” by Charles Wilkinson, “Man + Van” by David Penn, “The Night They Sacked New Rome” by Elaine Graham-Leigh and “Anathema: The Underside” by Chris Roper. The issue also features the announcement of the first annual Theaker’s Quarterly Award winners, and an essay on fake internet reviews, plus a selection of the fake reviews we wrote to raise money for Comic Relief on Red Nose Day.

Then there are ninety pages of real reviews, by Stephen Theaker, Jacob Edwards, Douglas J. Ogurek and Rafe McGregor.

Charles Wilkinson’s publications include The Pain Tree and Other Stories (London Magazine Editions), Ag & Au (a pamphlet of poems from Flarestack), and his collection of strange tales and weird fiction, A Twist in the Eye, now out from Egaeus Press. His stories have appeared in Best Short Stories 1990 (Heinemann), Best English Short Stories 2 (W.W. Norton), Unthology (Unthank Books), Best British Short Stories 2015 (Salt) and Best Weird Fiction 2015 (Undertow Books), as well as in genre magazines/anthologies such as Black Static, Supernatural Tales, Horror Without Victims, The Dark Lane Anthology, Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction, Phantom Drift, Bourbon Penn, Shadows & Tall Trees, and Nightscript. He lives in Powys, Wales.

Chris Roper is a copywriter living in London. He writes as much as he can in his spare time, exorcising horrible thoughts and bad dreams by committing them to paper. When not writing, he’s admonishing himself for not writing, which in turn leads him to red wine and Asian holidays.

David Penn’s short stories have appeared in the magazines Midnight Street, Whispers of Wickedness and previously in Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction, and his poems in Magma, Smith’s Knoll and the Poetry School anthology I Am Twenty People (Enitharmon, 2007). He lives in London, where he also works as a librarian.

Douglas J. Ogurek’s work has appeared in the BFS Journal, The Literary Review, Morpheus Tales, Gone Lawn, and several anthologies. Douglas’s website can be found at www.douglasjogurek.weebly.com.

Elaine Graham-Leigh is a writer and campaigner based in London. When not bringing down the system from within, she writes speculative fiction and has had previous stories published in Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction, Jupiter SF, Bewildering Stories and The Harrow. Her website: www.redpuffin.co.uk.

Howard Watts is a writer, artist and composer living in Seaford. He provides the spacetacular wraparound cover art for this issue. His artwork can be seen in its native resolution on his DeviantArt page: http://hswatts.deviantart.com. His novel The Master of Clouds is available on Kindle.

Jessy Randall’s science fiction stories and poems have appeared in Asimov’s, Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, Strange Horizons, and Theaker’s (“The Night of Red Butterflies”, December 2013). Her most recent book is Suicide Hotline Hold Music, a collection of poems and comics. She is a librarian at Colorado College and her website is bit.ly/JessyRandall.

Michael Wyndham Thomas’s novels include The Mercury Annual and Pilgrims at the White Horizon, and his poetry collections include Port Winston Mulberry, Batman’s Hill, South Staffs, Come to Pass and The Stations of the Day. His work has appeared in The Antioch Review, Critical Survey, The London Magazine, Magazine Six, Stand Magazine and the TLS. His novella “Esp” was shortlisted for the UK Novella Award. He is currently working on Nowherian, the fictionalised memoir of a Grenadian traveller. Twitter: @thomasmichaelw. Blog: swansreport.blogspot.co.uk. Website: www.michaelwthomas.co.uk.

Rafe McGregor is the author of The Value of Literature, The Architect of Murder, six collections of short fiction, and one hundred and fifty magazine articles, journal papers, and review essays. He lectures at the University of York and can be found online at @rafemcgregor.

Stephen Theaker is the co-editor of Theaker’s Quarterly Fiction, and the father of two amazing super-friends, one of whom also contributes a review to this issue.